The purpose of this blog is to report the different learning experiences in studies about an Open PhD focused on open learning. The different topics featured are: Educational Research, Educational Technology and Media, Educational Startup, Instructional Design, Open Education and learning

Friday, November 23, 2012

The Impact cycle

The purpose of a social entreprise represents its impact. Hopefully one would expect to make a positive impact. But some unexpected positive or negative impact might happen. It is important to take into account these considerations about the impact of one's social endevour:

1. Define the expected impact.
2. State a measure of the desired impact.
3. Find ways to get information about the unexpected positive or negative results.
4. Record the results obtained.

In creating Open Popular University the primary impact I expected to create is for people to realize that the accumulation of knowledge beyond the minimum is not a privilege reserved to a few. People have to realize how educational institutions can deceive people in attaining their educational goals. I have been myself deceived by some predators located behind some american so-called educational institutions. My realization is that the attainment of some degree of knowledge is not the prerogative of educational institutions, people with degrees or people with some exceptional cognitive abilities. Knowledge is not necessarily acquired from educators and educational institutions. Knowledge primarily resides in books and books are acquired by educational institutions. Now knowledge resides in the world wide web. Learning in formalized educational institutions is managed by private and government administrators who decide what to teach and who can teach. However learning doesn't take place exclusively in this manner. Knowledge is acquired by oneself from books, the web, radio, television and from family members, friends, the community, etc. Knowledge comes also from one's personal inquiry, intuition, reflection, etc. Whether one wants it or not knowledge starts from birth and stops at death at least in that lifetime. Learning is a lifelong process.

Specifically for Open Popular University the desired impact is that students. professionals, self-learners worldwide access the site to satisfy their educational needs. I expect that many people come to the site, spend a reasonable amount and come back. More specifically the impact for students is that they can use the site to understand concepts they misunderstood in class and to deepen their knowledge. Professionals can use the site to review a subject that they learned in college, undertake new studies or study a subject related to a project, etc. Educators can enrich their curriculum from the content of different subjects. More importantly the most important aspect of the impact is that people after spending a lot of time exploring the resources in the site are urged to cultivate self-learning and lifelong learning. I will measure this impact by surveying people who accessed the site.. This can be done by setting a form in the site asking people specific questions. It can also be done by e-mail and on other social media pages for Open Popular University. As in any human endevour there are unexpected positive or negative results. Unexpected positive results might be defined by people having obtained spectacular results from using the site. Unexpected negative results are that the site has made no impact on people. Unexpected positive results can be assessed by asking questions like: " What huge benefits have you gotten by using the site?". Unexpected negative results can be assessed by asking questions like this: " What are the negative effects of using the site? In summary the impact can be defined by the number of people accessing the site and the benefits obtained from its use.

In a follow-up to assess the impact I can report on the access of the site. Specifically I can say
1. I have had positive feedback from people using the site. Although there isn't a huge amount of people accessing the site but the number of users is growing.
2. As unexpected positive result I have seen the access increasing suddenly
3. I haven't seen any unexpected negative result.
The statistics suggest that people benefits from using the site because of a fair amount of returning users. The nature of the benefits cannot be assessed at this time but a protocol will be set for this. Cycling on the use of the site I will increase its marketing to make the access growing although the number of users suddenly keeps growing.

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About this Open PhD

The purpose of this blog is to report the different learning experiences in studies about an Open PhD focused on open learning. The different topics featured are: Educational Research, Educational Technology and Media, Educational Startup, Instructional Design, Open Education and learning. The main focus of this PhD is on open learning specifically the use of the web resources and possibly other informal educational resources for self-directed and independent learning with an emphasis on web 2.0 tools for learning and personal learning networks. It's achieved by skills learning, projects, writing, teaching and research. Skills learning is done by taking different open courses and reading different articles, shared on social medias, educational project pages, curated on appropriated on social media platforms, listed on social media networks and saved on social bookmarks. The author designed many educational projects mostly focused on Open Educational Resources, Open Courseware and Open Education. As an experienced educator certified in math he is taking his educational career on the next level by developping Open Popular University www.openpu.wikidot.com and New Direction Education Services www.ndes.wikidot.com where his educational services are advertised. The author writes and pulishes educational articles on his personal blogs and social media. He also curates several articles on appropriate social media platforms.

Other artifacts used for this PhD are Educational and Professional Portfolio and Open PhD candidacy published in Peer-to-Peer University and Wikiversity . The PhD is by research and publication. The articles on Open learning will be used for the publication of a book on open learning. The next phase will be the developement of a thesis. Meanwile and/or after the publication of the thesis the blog will publish academic research on self-directed learning, comment on this research, publish litterature reviews and original research, essays, original research focused mostly on Action Research. It is the intention of the author to work with supervisors, peers, educators, interested organizations in this innovative PhD to get the most widely recognition. The author is interested in having is work validated or credited by a respected educational institution believing in innovative ways of learning

About Me

Yves Simon is an experienced educator certified in Math, self-directed and lifelong learner interested in various ways of learning and media and web technology resources. His educational background is in Civil Engineering, Math, Physics, Science, languages, Educational Administration, Curriculum and Instruction and open learning. He provides face-to-face and online tutoring and teaching services.He also provides other services such as translation in French and English, Math content development and writing and article writing. Visit his website New Direction Education Services at www.ndes.wikidot.com to contact him about services provided. He is particular engaged in the dissemination of web educational resources and tools for learning.

Educational content curation

Open Popular university brings to the world courses from the most respected universities around the world at the graduate and undergraduate level in the fields of Engineering, Math, Science, Education, Human Sciences, etc, In the future Open Popular university will offer online courses directly from this site. For support, collaboration, contact, donation, etc visit the site at www. openpu.wikidot.com. Your support, collaboration and donations will help this site running. Open Popular University is looking for volunteers to teach online courses and needs funds for paid staff to develop the site, a physical location and materials to fulfill its mission to help thousands of learners, self-learners and educators worldwide. The ambition is to bring the world open courses in this site, demystify the fact that knowledge is the privilege of a few and can only be learned in formal institutions.

Math course by Yves Simon

This is a free math course offered by Yves Simon, certified and experienced math educator. For tutoring online and face-to-face, teaching online and face-to-face in the following subjects: Math, ESL, French and Spanish visit NewDirection Education Services at www.ndes.wikidot.com Calculus course